Regional airlines gain new cachet
1st-class seating, roomer cabins help upgrade experienceAssociated PressPublished July 7, 2007MINNEAPOLIS -- Airlines are rushing to add new regional jets with first-class seats, roomier cabins and, in some cases, hot food.
The carriers are hoping business travelers tired of a cramped 50-seat jet will pay extra for a flight experience closer to what they get on a mainline jet. The addition could help airlines turn a profit on flights that generally have been a loss leader feeding traffic into long-haul flights, though rising fuel prices could complicate the plan.
Airlines that recently went through bankruptcy -- Northwest, Delta and United -- have the most leeway to add such jets because of relaxed restrictions in their pilot contracts.
Northwest Airlines is adding 72 new 76-seat jets through next year. Half will be Bombardier CRJ-900s flown by its Mesaba subsidiary and the other half will be Embraer 175s flown by its new Compass subsidiary. Both include a dozen first-class seats, and the cabin is roomier than on Northwest's other regional jets.
Delta Air Lines plans to fly 77 dual-class regional jets by the end of 2008, and United's regional partners fly about 115 70-seat jets with coach, first-class and an Economy Plus seat with extra legroom.
Delta spokeswoman Betsy Talton said business customers have been asking for the regional first-class seats for years. The aim with the new jets is "to make it all more seamless and more like the mainline jet experience," she said.
First-class seats on Northwest's new jets will include the same level of meal service as on regular flights. Northwest said it helped design its version of the Bombardier CRJ900, which has 6 feet 2 inches from floor to ceiling in the aisle, and windows that are 25 percent bigger than an earlier version of the CRJ900.
That's a big improvement over the 50-seaters often used on regional routes, even if doesn't quite match mainline flying, said aviation consultant George Hamlin of Airline Capital Associates Inc.
"You had to be a midget to see out the windows of the 50-seater, it was so low," he said.
With regional jets covering longer distances, passengers are spending two hours or more on board those planes, making a first-class seat more desirable.
"As other carriers like Northwest and Delta and United roll out regional equipment that offers two-class configurations, that will turn out to be a competitive advantage for them," said Darin Lee, senior managing economist at aviation consultancy LECG in Cambridge, Mass.
With high oil prices, even the new 76-seat jets are only a little better, said aviation consultant John Walsh of Walsh Aviation in Annapolis, Md.
He said that fuel might account for about a quarter of the cost of flying a mainline jet, but it can be as much as 40 percent of the cost of flying a regional jet. That's because the fuel cost is spread among fewer passengers, and the gas-guzzling takeoff is a larger proportion of the shorter flight.
Meanwhile, American Airlines has its feeder American Eagle flying just 25 jets with 70 seats, none of them first class. The contract with pilots is stricter at Continental Airlines, allowing no regional jets with more than 50 seats.
"It's kind of ironic," said aviation consultant Doug Abbey of the Velocity Group in Washington. "By avoiding bankruptcy, they're actually relatively constrained compared to those carriers that have been able to modify work rules in bankruptcy."
